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Collaborating for Early‐Age Career Awareness: A Comparison of Three Instructional Formats
Author(s) -
Colston Nicole,
Thomas Julie,
Ley M. Tyler,
Ivey Toni,
Utley Juliana
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of engineering education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.896
H-Index - 108
eISSN - 2168-9830
pISSN - 1069-4730
DOI - 10.1002/jee.20166
Subject(s) - outreach , preparedness , curriculum , engineering education , mathematics education , psychology , engineering , medical education , pedagogy , engineering management , medicine , management , political science , law , economics
Abstract Background Early‐age engineering education can enhance preparedness and generate interest in engineering careers prior to college. This article reports on collaboration between a university engineer and science teacher educators to introduce engineering career awareness in elementary classrooms. The resulting elementary school curriculum, Engineering is Everywhere, features video instruction by the engineer, a teacher activity guide, and a materials kit. Purpose/Research Questions Our research question was, “How might engineers and educators best collaborate in elementary engineering outreach efforts?” We co‐developed curricula, prepared classroom teachers, and compared fifth‐grade student learning outcomes to determine the most beneficial type of engineer instruction. Design/Method A quasi‐experimental research design assessed the effectiveness of three instructional formats: engineer‐led, engineer‐visit, and engineer‐video. Pre‐ and post‐tests captured changes in fifth‐grade students' understanding about the work of engineers and attitudes about engineering. Results Findings indicated significant gains in all students' understanding, with some differences across the three instructional formats. The engineer‐led students did not show significant changes in overall engineering attitudes. Only the engineer‐video students demonstrated significant gains in engineering job interests. Conclusions A qualitative comparison of the costs and benefits of each instructional format raised important considerations for planning engineer outreach. We recommend that engineers collaborate with science teacher educators in the design of video instruction and assist in preparing elementary classroom teachers to administer the lesson activities.